Fire and Ice
by atyrysh
Summary: Azula meets a water bender at the party on Ember Island. Why is he there? Who is he? And can she trust him?


This first chapter begins at the party on Ember Island. Criticisms accepted and appreciated.

* * *

Azula leaned back against the wall. She had tried to strike up conversations earlier in the evening, but the participants all found something else they had to do, a person they had to say hi to, or another distractions that needed their immediate attention. The truth was, no one could stay Azula's powerful presence for long.

An argument caught her ear. Two girls were yelling at a boy for ruining their summer, and the boy was yelling back at them for ruining his evening. Typical teenage stuff. Although Azula had never had that kind of argument before. She probably never would.

"Thank God you're here, Azula." Ty Lee walked up to her, a new drink in her hand. "Those boys won't leave me alone. I guess they all just like me too much."

"Come on, Ty Lee. You can't be this ignorant," Azula said, as she watched one of the girls from the argument splash a drink in the boy's face.

"What do you mean?" asked Ty Lee. The two girls were now storming away. The boy fumed, following and insulting them.

Azula explained to Ty Lee how the boys didn't really like her. She was a tease and she was too easy. Ty Lee's eyes went shiny with tears. She turned around to hide them, and bumped right into that fuming boy that was passing behind her. The drink in her hand spilt all over his shirt as she said "Oops." The two girls he was insulting noticed what happened, but just snickered to each other and kept walking.

The boy was less pleased. He grabbed Ty Lee by the arm, put his face right up against hers and said "God dammit. I'm going to wring the neck off the next person that throws a drink at me."

"I'm sorry," said Ty Lee. "I didn't see you there."

"Sure, you didn't. And what did I do to this one, huh? Did I ruin your summer, too?"

Ty Lee didn't deserve this. She was already upset, so Azula took a glass from the closest person, walked up behind the boy, and poured the drink on his head.

"What did I just say?" The boy turned around, his red eyes glaring at Azula. Now, his face was right up to hers.

"She said she's sorry. Now leave," Azula matched his stare.

The boy just smirked at her, red eyes gleaming.

"That's what I said to those two girls. That didn't stop them from yelling at me," he said.

"No, well maybe you should have thought of that before you insulted them. Anyway, this was an accident. Stop complaining." Azula said.

The boy snorted.

Chan, who noticed all the commotion, walked up to them and gestured to the wet floor. "What are you guys doing? You're going to ruin the hardwood," he complained. The boy that had been holding Azula by her arm had let her go at the interruption.

Chan turned to Azula "I told you not break anything. The floor counts, too. Get out of this party."

"Chan, I'm sorry." The boy with the red eyes piped up before Azula could retort. "It was all my fault. I was feeling awful hot and asked this pretty girl if she could cool me off. Really, I was pretty much asking for this whole mess to happen."

Chan eyed him for a second.

"Alright, Iqqio. The girl can stay. Just make sure it doesn't happen again." Chan gave them all a suspicious look before leaving.

"What did you do that for?" Azula asked the red eyed boy, but he wasn't paying attention to her. Instead, he was leaning over Ty Lee's ear, whispering something, and the girl was giggling. _Another boy enamored by Ty Lee._

"Yeah, you think?" Ty Lee laughed.

"Mhmm," he nodded. "Without a doubt. But excuse me for a moment, I need to show your friend something."

He offered Azula his hand and said "Come."

Behind him, when Azula looked at her, Ty Lee shrugged. Azula, herself, was kind of curious as to what this boy wanted to show her, so, after that small hesitation, she took his hand.

He led her through all of the party goers to the very back. He led her through the double doors that lead to the patio and stopped at the balcony. Here, the two were alone. He took her other hand, as well, and turned her so they were face to face, the view of the ocean to Azula's right and the sounds of the party to her left.

"Do you want to know why those two girls were yelling at me?" he asked.

"You ruined their summer," Azula said. She had heard some of their argument.

"You know more than I thought," The boy laughed. "But do you know how?"

"I guess you were rude to them." Azula shrugged.

The boy brought her right hand up, closing all her fingers but the pointer finger, and bent down his head so their vision was on a matching level. With her finger, he pointed into the ocean, and said "Look."

At first, Azula didn't see anything. After a while, the moonlight seemed to get brighter. She saw the ripples in the sea. And where he was pointing, she saw a break in the waves. There, in the middle of the ocean was a broken boat, half submerged in water.

"You sunk their ship," Azula realized.

"Yes. And do you know why I sunk their ship?" He brought Azula's hand back down, straightening out his spine, and this time placing his hands on her upper arms. "They invited me to go fishing on that boat. I happily accepted. But then, when we were out there, they decided to go swimming instead. I told them, 'Stop swimming. You're scaring away all the fish.' But they didn't. How inconsiderate of them not to hold to their invitation. I warned them to stop. That they would regret it if they didn't. They didn't care, and I sunk their ship."

As he was relaying the story, he moved one of his hands up to the back of her neck, touching it lightly. Azula was nervous. _This man knows what he wants, and he's dangerous_. Not as dangerous as Azula, to be sure. But he came closer to her level than all of the other boys at the party. Those boys that were so intimidated by her.

He smiled at her, stroking her neck and looking into her eyes with those red ones. His hair was still damp from the alcohol.

Slowly, he brought his lips down to hers. She didn't move to lean into the kiss. All the same, his lips touched hers. Lightly at first. Then a little more passionately. And he moved his other hand to stroke her cheek. He tasted sweet, like appletini.

Azula was angry when he broke it off. She opened her eyes, not remembering that she even closed them, and met his red ones. This time they looked at her concerned.

"And what did I tell you?" he asked "Before you doused my head?"

"You didn't tell me anything. We didn't even speak until I poured the drink on you," Azula said.

"No, but you heard me say it. I said I'd wring the neck off the next person who spilt a drink on me. You did. And what kind of man would I be if I didn't keep my word." He caressed the back of her neck lightly with his hands.

"A man with a head," said Azula, looking him straight in the eye.

He sighed, and his hands moved so they had a good grip on her neck, though a light one. His eyes looked even more concerned.

Then he squeezed his hands together. Azula gasped in surprise, or tried to. It was too hard to breathe. She didn't believe he would do it. Writhing in pain, Azula recovered from the initial shock and delivered an uppercut to his stomach.

The boy buckled over. He let go of her neck and held his stomach.

"How dare you?" said Azula.

"I was only keeping my word," the boy gasped. "Now you know you can trust what I say. And I give you my word, I won't hurt you again."

"Keep your stupid word. I don't need it." She left him on the patio, just in time too. Zuko had just gotten kicked out of the party.

Azula didn't mention what happened on the patio to Ty Lee, Mai, or Zuko. And later that night, when she returned to trash Chan's place for throwing such a lousy party, she was sorry that the red-eyed boy wasn't there to punish as well.


End file.
